


Next Thursday

by pillowred



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Alternate Universe, Consensual Sex, Drug Use, M/M, Public Blow Jobs, Slight Violence, Unrequited Love, feeling useless, joshler - Freeform, well kinda unrequited love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-21
Updated: 2017-04-21
Packaged: 2018-10-22 06:57:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10692066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pillowred/pseuds/pillowred
Summary: "how can you tell?""intuition"





	Next Thursday

**Author's Note:**

> please comment if possible bc i'm trying to work on my writing :)
> 
> ps: i just realized that the bullet points are indented to the left instead of being centered. does anyone know how to fix that?

It's Thursday. Josh usually doesn't like strings. He thinks they're twangy and obnoxious. Too twangy and too obnoxious. But this time he's interested, intrigued, even. He can't take his eyes off the man with the ukulele. Maybe it's because his hair was fluffy and strands were falling in his face. Plastered to his face. It made Josh uncomfortable, he wanted to brush it away but that would be weird, right? to brush hair off a strangers face. Maybe it's because of the way his hands moved fast. So fast. Josh imagined those hands on him. His thighs, his chest. He strummed good too, really good. Most of the people that play strings around town just played the same tune and had no style. This guy was different and Josh makes a mental note to talk to him before he goes home. 

He's rushing. He's rushing somewhere and Josh sees him. Josh wants to catch up but he doesn't. He doesn't want him to be late. 

•

There he is again. There he is in the grocery store. Two isles down. It's January now and freezing but he's wearing just a black long sleeved shirt. Josh doesn't have time to wonder why. He sees himself behind the boy, a finger tapping his shoulder. 

But he doesn't. He watches him go through the spice section and pick out oregano and rosemary. Josh wonders if he can cook. 

_Of course he can, you idiot. Why else would he be buying it?_

_maybe he just likes the smell._

Josh goes home that night and doesn't sleep. He thinks about how the boy sounds when he's tired. 

•

It's Thursday. Josh goes back to see if the boy will be there. He is. He's introduced on the stage as 'Tyler Fucking Joseph.' He's singing and smiling. He looks happy and Josh doesn't take his eyes off of him. He's golden, swaying from side to side. the chord progressions accompanied by his voice is orgasmic. 

"There's no 'fucking' in my name, by the way, It's just Tyler Joseph, preferably Tyler."

Everyone laughs and claps as he walks off the stage. 

Next Thursday, Tyler sings about trees and something torturing his sleep and trying not to be afraid.

He cries and nobody notices except Josh. 

Josh cries, too. 

Everyone claps as he walks off the stage. 

He doesn't rush that night. He strolls holding his ukulele in his hand. A blunt in the other. 

"I liked the last one. The one about a 'mask that portrays that we don't need grace' and not being afraid."

Tyler nods, "thank you. I wasn't sure I wanted to sing it tonight."

"Why not?"

"I didn't think it was good."

"It was more than good."

Tyler brings the blunt to his lips. Red lips. "I didn't catch your name."

"Josh."

"Josh," Tyler lets out a cloud of smoke. "Nice meeting you but I have somewhere to be. I'm sorry. We'll see again." 

Tyler turns on his heels and starts walking 

Josh panics. "Can I suck your dick?"

_Fuck._

Tyler turns to look at him, "What?"

_Abort mission._

"Can I suck your dick?"

_You fucking idiot._

Tyler shoves his hands in his pocket as a smirk creeps across his face. "Okay."

Josh looks around. "Where do you wanna do this?"

"I'm a fucking slut, dude. Anywhere's good."

And they find their way into an ally and shoo the cats away. Josh doesn't start slowly, he takes all of Tyler into his mouth. Into his throat. Tyler tangles his hands through the thickness of Josh's hair, pulling him deeper. They moan and curse and grab and squeeze. Tyler rolls his hips and sounds like he's crying when he comes. Josh works himself, biting into Tyler's thigh and breathing heavily. He comes white high pitched whimpers and and tears in the corner of his eyes. 

"Do you wanna hang out some time?" Tyler says still breathing heavily. 

Josh looks at him, trying to regulate his breathing, and nods with a wide smile. 

They don't exchange numbers. Josh decides he'll look for Tyler when the time comes. 

•

"Dude he could have had an STD or something." A voice sounded over the phone, "or what if he was one of those voodoo guys that live downtown? What if he magiced you into sucking his dick? is that a word? is magiced a word?"

Josh sighed. "Brendon, I wanted to suck his dick since Thursday two weeks ago, you never know if you're gonna die in five seconds. And no, magiced isn't a word."

"Ambitious."

Josh rolls his eyes, "Get dressed, I'm coming over."

"Where are we going?"

"Nowhere. I just don't want to see you naked again when I come over this time."

"To be fair, that time you didn't tell me you were and it's my home."

"Whatever dude just put on some shorts or whatever."

Josh hangs up. He's tired and rethinks going to visit Brendon. He wonders why he even offered and calls himself an idiot for the third time in the span of 70 hours. 

There's something dead in front of his apartment complex and it's probably the old man that lives on the last floor. His pets are always dying. Last week it was a possum and he asked Josh to come clean up the remains of it because it was beginning to stink up the place. Josh was willing to help but he lied to the man that he was moving out the next day just because he didnt want to be stuck with clean up duty again. 

"What did he taste like?"

"Like... cheap cologne and candy corn."

"Candy corn?"

"Fucking candy corn."

"Candy corn fucking sucks."

"Candy corn does fucking suck but he tasted good."

"I didn't even know you liked dudes."

"I like everyone as long as they're cool."

"You never told me."

"Was there ever a need to?"

Brendon shrugs "I guess not."

"But I like mostly dudes, though."

"I knew it."

They laugh as Brendon maneuvers his way over the couch to get the remote. They scroll through over five hundred channels but there's nothing to watch. Brendon talks about how he got fired from his job as a waiter the other day and Josh let's him rest his head on his lap. 

"You should come with me on Thursday. Next Thursday to watch Tyler."

"Wait didn't you just suck his dick? Won't that be awkward?"

"Mm...yeah but he said we were gonna hang  
out."  


•

Next Thursday, Brendon gets drunk and starts getting naked before Tyler can even be called on stage. Josh has to take him home. 

_Brendon: dude, I'm sorry_

_Brendon: pick up_

_Brendon: at least answer my fucking texts so I can know you're alive??_

_Brendon: how long are you gonna be mad?_

Josh answers that one and switches off his phone. 

_a while._

•

The next day someone knocks on the door. He answers it at Tyler is standing there in the black shirt he saw him with the day at the grocery store. 

"How'd you find me?"

"I told you we were gonna hang out."

Tyler walks in and closes Josh closes the door behind him. 

"What do you want?"

"To hang out."

"No, what do you really want?"

"To hang out, Josh. It gets lonely when you have no friends?"

He pulls out a cigarette and offers Josh one but he declines. Smoking is bad and makes your teeth yellow, right? Tyler's are still white. 

"Why'd you offer to suck my dick the other day?"

"I was horny. A man can't be horny?"

"Why me?"

"My tongue wanted you."

Tyler faces the television and smiles a smile that could hardly be classified as a smile and puts his cigarette back in his mouth. 

Josh tried smoking once when he was twelve. He sputtered and coughed all over the place and got laughed at.

"Give me that." 

Tyler handed the cigarette to him and he inspected it before putting it in his mouth. 

_Suck don't inhale,_  
_Suck don't inhale_

His eyes watered as he he blew out a fog and handed it back to Tyler,

"Do you smoke?"

"Not really."

"I can tell."

"How can you tell?"

Tyler shrugged, "Intuition."

•

He keeps thinking about Josh and he doesn't know why. His lips. The way his hair sticks out of his hat. He doesn't look at where he's going and trips on a pile of trash. 

It's 6am in the morning. He doesn't know why he's awake or even why he's walking around town like a lunatic with red bags under his eyes and fists curled inside his jacket pocket. He stole the jacket from a homeless person and didn't even feel bad about it. Tyler is a dick. 

He strolls past Josh's apartment. Why are the lights on? Work probably. 

Tyler doesn't have a job. Well, he has one every Thursday night that doesn't pay very well but he doesn't have an actual job. The last time he had a job, he was seventeen and working at a fancy restaurant that payed nineteen dollars an hour but he had to quit because of college and now he's twenty four and has a useless degree in English that lays at the bottom of a box somewhere along with things he wants to forget.

He always wanted to do music. He knew he wanted to be a musician as soon as he could talk and when he sang everyone loved it and he was sure he could be just that. 

But here he is roaming the streets of a town that could have been prettier and trying to get money from a singing at a bar that he's starting to lose faith in. 

"I'll be okay." He would tell himself. And no matter what, he believed so. 

• 

  
It's March now and Josh goes to all his shows.

He plays four times a week and gets $40 per show now because Josh had to force him to ask for better pay. 

"They don't even need me." He said, "They're even doing me a favour. I can't be asking for a raise."

"That place only ever has people there when they know you're going to be there have you seen it on any night that's not Thursday? It looks like the rapture happened."

"I can't."

"You can."

Tyler went to Josh's house to tell him he also got an additional three nights at the bar and they kissed. 

"That was awkward."

"You sucked my dick, Josh. This is the least awkward thing that's happened between us."

•

It's July now. Tyler's moved into a much better apartment and given the homeless man two jackets. He plays songs and Josh watches and even sings along to a few.  
He's written two songs and needed Josh's assurance that it's good before he sings it at a show. 

Once, at the end of a gig, someone asked him if he had anyone in mind when he sang some songs. 

"Sometimes I have Chinese rice in mind."

They laughed and so did he. 

"Sometimes I think about my boyfriend. Well, sort of my boyfriend."

When he's asked who it is, he says he'll introduce him to them in due time. 

They usually walk home laughing and talking about people most nights and Josh leaves him to walk home alone because Josh's place is closer and Tyler insisted on it after days of arguing. 

This night is different. They don't speak at all until they're at Josh's place. 

"Who's your boyfriend?"

Tyler knits his eyebrows "Who do you think it is?"

"I'm not sure."

"Do you think it's you?"

"Is it?"

"If you want it to be."

Josh shakes his head "I don't."

"Why not?"

"Why me?"

"Because, in case you didn't notice, we've kind of seen each other almost everyday for the past year and it's hard not to feel.." Tyler threw his arms up, "I don't know. Something."

They're standing now. They're standing in the dark 11pm air and they're not speaking. Josh is looking at the ground, at the lamp post, at the third floor windows, anywhere but Tyler's eyes. 

"Are you okay?"

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. You ca—"

"Go home."

Josh turns and starts walking to his apartment complex. 

"What?"

"Go home."

Tyler stands there with arms glued to his sides. "Are you seriously doing this right now?"

"I'm not—" He shakes his head and can't let go of his hands. "Look. Trust me it's better for both you and me tonight just," he sighs, "Go home."

Tyler watches as Josh opens the door and it shuts behind him. His ears and neck get hot and his hands curled into fists as he shoved them into his coat pockets and walks home fast. 

He doesn't sleep and texts Josh by four in the morning. 

_are you awake?_

_yeah_

_are you okay?_

_i am_

_why aren't you asleep?_

_why aren't you?_

__

__

_i asked first_

_im thinking, you?_

_thinking too. writing_

_a song? can i see?_

_not a song. a story._

_about what?_

_a boy. a boy and a boy._

_what are their names?_

_Ashby and Max for now. They're in high school and I'm trying to make it as not cliché as possible. Max is homeless and Ashby helps_

_it sounds good_

_thank you_

 

Tyler drops his phone and picks it up a minute later. 

_i'm sorry_

_it's okay, ty_

_if i made you uncomfortable or anything, or if you felt like i was pushing it i promise i didn't mean to_

_i overreacted_

_no i made you uncomfortable and i really am sorry about it_

_TYLER. i promise you're fine. you didn't make me uncomfortable_

_then why'd you act like that?_

_i don't know. it just happens sometimes. i think we should sleep_

_i think we should. goodnight_

_goodnight_

 

•

"This song is going to be a good one." Josh said, "I can tell."

"How can you tell?"

"Intuition."

Tyler smiles and looks back at his ukulele, strumming awkward chords with his eyes closed and upper lip in his mouth. 

"What are you thinking of?"

"You. Your lips on my lips."

"That already happened before." 

"It did?"

"When you got a better job."

"I don't remember that."

"Stop lying."

"How did it go?"

Josh knelt down and cupped Tyler's face slowly then jammed their lips together. 

Tyler pulled away, bottom lip bleeding and eyes wide open. "What the hell did you do that for?"

"You wanted to know how it was."

"It was not like that"

"That's what it felt like to me. You were kind of overly excited so I don't blame you."

"What did you wish it felt like?"

"I wish I didn't feel it at all."

Tyler rolls his eyes, "Why are you acting like this?"

"Like what?"

Tyler sighs, "Nothing."

Tyler strums and strums and strums and strums until his index finger starts to bleed but he still doesn't stop and Josh doesn't stop him.

Josh looks at him but he doesn't tell him to stop or attempt to stop him and there's blood on his thighs now. 

There's blood on his shirt and there's blood on his toes but he doesn't stop until one of the strings snap and now he's hurdling it towards the wall and it's going to leave a dent Josh won't fix for another six months to a year. 

He turns to Josh, face red, tears in his eyes and blood on his hands, "You didn't even try stopping me."

"You needed it."

"Needed what?"

"To let it out."

Tyler looks at Josh with disgust, "You're a bad person, Josh. Do you know that? Do you know that you're a bad person?"

"Tyler—"

"No. Shut up," Tyler picks up the broken parts of his ukulele, "don't even try and defend yourself here."

"Don't tell me to shut up, okay you're the one who didn't want to stop."

"Do you think I like blood on my fingers? You think I like not having a ukulele?"

"Did I tell you to cut your fingers? Did I tell you to break your ukulele?! Tyler you're not a fucking child—"

"Shut up okay just shut up!"

They're quiet now and Tyler is crying. Josh has never seen him cry before and now he feels very bad. 

"Tyler, I—"

"No you're not sorry, Josh. Delete my number."

"What?"

"Delete my number and bang your head on a wall of it helps you forget my address."

"There's no need for you to do this, Tyler."

"Oh there is." He wipes his nose and eyes with the sleeve of his shirt. He drops a $100 dollar note on the table and says it's for the damage. "Bleach and hot water will take off the blood stains. By the way, you were right about one thing. I do feel better." And that's the last thing he says before he closes the door. 

 

• 

  
He tries calling Tyler but it doesn't work out. This is the seventh time he's calling and there's still no answer.

_tyler please pick up. or answer my texts at least._  
_i'm sorry man okay?_  
_i should have stopped you but i didn't._  
_can you please say something at least??_

__

Nothing. Tyler doesn't answer his phone or reply his texts so he texts Brendon and Gabe telling them to come over and that he fucked up. 

•

He tells his boss that his fingers broke and he doesn't play that week or the week after.  
Next Thursday, Tyler doesn't see Josh's red hair in the crowd. He doesn't see Josh's teeth and squinty eyes when he smiles. He sees some people singing the lyrics but he doesn't see anyone singing every single lyric with him. That night he sings about betrayal and when he's asked about his 'boyfriend', he tells them that he died. 

"That must be rough for you to go through, Tyler. You can have as many weeks off as you like if you want. 

"I don't need any."

Tyler wishes he liked his boss. She was beautiful and had a heart tattoo on her cheek below her right eye and in the year and a month that he had worked with her, she was the nicest person he had ever known. 

"Thank you for always being so nice to me, Marina."

"You're like my brother. And I love my brother a lot." She smiles at him

And he smiles back, hugging her and telling her about Josh. Telling her how he's never felt this way about someone before and no matter how hard he tried, he just couldn't let him go. Telling her how it hurts so much and how he wants to rip his heart out of his chest to stop him from feeling anything. He tells her Josh didn't die. She tells him she knows. 

He walks home alone that night and it feels weird but it gives him space. He passes Josh's house and the lights are off this time. The lights are off.

**Author's Note:**

> i may delete this then re-upload it with more because i feel like it's too short.
> 
>  
> 
> update may.17.17: i think its good this way :)


End file.
